


Fly With Melted Wings

by Ellegrine



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Amnesia Jason Todd, Blood and Gore, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Gen, Hurt Jason Todd, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Torture, Jason Todd Needs A Hug, Jason Todd is Robin, Major Character Injury, Never Repost My Work Anywhere, Protective Bruce Wayne, Resurrected Jason Todd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-01-13
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:58:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22245442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ellegrine/pseuds/Ellegrine
Summary: Jason has no clue where he is or how he got here. The last thing he remembers is crawling away from a bomb, desperate to reach the door.
Relationships: Jason Todd & Bruce Wayne
Comments: 47
Kudos: 552





	Fly With Melted Wings

Jason Todd wakes up. His head is pounding, screaming at him, and he knows what a concussion is, okay? He used to get them all the time when Willis was around. So he recognizes the symptoms.

He rolls over just enough to throw up.

It’s only once he opens his eyes that Jason realizes he just vomited on a decapitated body.

“What the hell?”

Jason tries to scramble backwards, but he slips and lands in a pool of blood. It soaks into his hair; the pain in his head worsens as his skull smacks against concrete.

“Oh, crap.”

Something is digging into Jason’s back. He reaches to move it, hands clumsy and missing like he’s downed an entire bottle of bourbon. He loathes concussions. He hates how they slow his reflexes, how they make his vision blur, how the simplest of tasks seems like climbing Mt. Everest.

He sits up slowly, wincing at the feel of blood soaking into his pants. The smell hits him then — copper and viscera. It’s thick and cloying in the air. Jason vomits so hard in reaction that tears stream down his face. 

“Ugh! I can taste it!”

Jason slaps a blood-wet hand on his shirt, wipes it the best he can, and then pulls the front of his shirt up to cover his mouth and nose. It doesn’t eliminate the stench, but it helps muffle it just enough. Once he can breathe without losing his gorge again, he glances around the room — warehouse? — he’s in. 

_ There are dead bodies everywhere. _

“What the hell happened?”

Jason isn’t an innocent. He’s from Crime Alley; he was weaned on the scum of human society. He grew up to the sound of police sirens — when they were brave enough to patrol — and women screaming, gunshots, choked off cries for help, and kids crying their eyes out from the pain of a stomach so empty it seemed to be swallowing them whole from the inside out.

But this isn’t a crime scene.

_ This is a massacre. _

He slides on his butt to the nearest metal pillar, because if he tries to stand in that  _ lake of blood, _ he’s going to slip and fall. Jason wants away from it. He’s already covered in more blood than he wanted on him in his entire life.

Jason flinches as he realizes he’s basically wearing death-soaked clothes.

Half the people eviscerated and decapitated and amputated and impaled and mutilated are wearing the traditional uniforms of the League of Assassins. He would recognize them anywhere. B made sure Jason would be able to recognize them, always did his best to drill Jason on all of their enemies and how to evade them if at all possible.

“Promise me you’ll stay safe, that you won’t intentionally take them on alone,” Bruce Wayne had demanded as he taught Jason. He was in the Batman suit when he said it, but his voice was all protective dad.

“I promise, Dad,” Jason had said.

He meant it too. Jason always kept his promises. He never once went looking for a Rogue on his own, trying to prove his worth. Overconfidence got people killed. Jason hadn’t survived the Narrows just to get himself killed once he actually managed to  _ get out. _

Jason is desperately trying not to think about the League uniform  _ he’s _ wearing. He’s trying so hard not to wonder why the thing that was trapped under his back is a sabre strapped to it. He’s trying to pretend he doesn’t have guns in holsters on his thighs, and that the one on the left doesn’t feel significantly heavier than the one on the right. Because, hell, no, he did not kill anyone!

_ Robin doesn’t kill people! _

He wasn’t out murdering people on Ra’s al Ghul’s orders.

_ He absolutely wasn’t! _

“How did I get here?”

His arms shake and his head swims, vision briefly turning black, as Jason hauls himself to his feet. His shirt slips off his face and he grits his teeth against the pungent odor that hits him full-face. From up here, the nightmare is even worse. 

But it’s the silence that’s haunting.

Because for one second, Jason wants to hear anything, anything at all — even the Joker laughing, “Forehand!” before shattering his ribs with a crowbar.

Jason has no clue where he is or how he got here. The last thing he remembers is crawling away from a bomb, desperate to reach the door. 

He wasn’t stupid; he knew it would be locked, but he wasn’t going to give up! He would gnaw through the door like a rat if he had to do it, because Jason Todd didn’t give up. He didn’t surrender. 

He had learned that lesson  _ young. _

If you did, if you thought for one second the world was going to give you something good, then you didn’t belong to Crime Alley and you didn’t know how the real world worked.

If you want to live, you have to  _ force _ the world to accept your existence.

“Okay, think. Resources. What … what’s available at hand?”

Jason grabs the sword, confused and loathing how familiar the hilt feels in his hand. He’s never held a sword in his life. He shouldn’t know anything about how to use a sword.

_ It feels like home in his hands. _

He swallows a scream.

He releases the hilt and stares down his body, shuddering. Jason wants to leave the guns. Because, hell, if B sees him with guns.... He squeezes his eyes shut and bites his lip. Crying never solves anything. Not a single thing.  _ Not ever. _ B will understand.

_ He will. _

Even sure of that, Jason hates that they’re on his body. He has a guilt-hate relationship with guns. Without them, Bruce’s parents — Jason’s grandparents — never would have died; Bruce never would have become Batman and wouldn’t have adopted Jason. But … decades later, Martha and Thomas Wayne’s deaths still haunt and hurt Bruce. He feels unbelievably guilty that a tiny part of him is glad they’re gone, because it opened the way for him to be adopted, to have a dad and a brother and to be safe. 

He reaches for his right ear instinctively, already calling, “B! Nightwing!” before realizing he’s not wearing a comm.

He swallows and squeezes his eyes shut.

“Okay, okay. Assess. No idea where I am. No comm. No clue what happened.”

Jason tries to think, but his head is killing him and he feels  _ so overwhelmed. _ It’s not supposed to be scary like this. B and Nightwing always show up when he’s in over his head. And he hasn’t been in  _ this _ over his head in … ever, actually.

“Situation? All screwed up. Solution? B or Nightwing,” Jason says and straightens his shoulders. 

He’s about to take a step when he remembers that Nightwing isn’t even on the planet. Well, there goes half his options.

Jason really, really hopes B tracks him down soon. He must be tearing Gotham? the world? — Jason has no clue where he is — apart. It’s probably a frantic game of Where In The World Is Robin? back at the Batcave, if B isn’t searching in a methodical pattern himself while the Batcomputer runs algorithms and such to try and track Jason down.

“How long have I been missing? He’s going to be so pissed. I won’t get to patrol for weeks!”

As the copper-blood scent hits him again, Jason admits to himself that maybe getting benched will be a good thing this time. He needs a break.

So, he’ll get in contact with B, and then B will help Jason figure out what the hell happened here. B will know why Jason is here, wearing this League of Assassins outfit. 

“Crap! I’m undercover, aren’t I?” 

Oh, that makes so much sense! For some reason, likely the source of his concussion, he’s lost the memories since B saved him from the Joker’s bomb. How else would Jason have gotten out of that mess? And now he can’t remember whatever undercover mission he’s on; he’s forgotten all the details and the briefing.

“Okay, so, B saved me.” 

Tears prick Jason’s eyes and spill down his cheeks at that realization. He had believed, the whole time that the Joker was whaling on him, that B would come and save him. And B had. 

_ B had! _

_ His dad had saved him. _

It takes a minute for Jason to get his breathing and emotions back under control. Because, even believing in his dad with his whole heart, Jason had still been scared. He had still been terrified and in pain as the Joker tortured him.

Judging by the lack of pain in his ribs, that had been a while ago. Because  _ now _ Jason is undercover with the League of Shadows. So … “How much time have I lost? How many check-ins did I miss?”

Something must have gone wrong. So  _ epically _ wrong. 

Because B would never approve of Jason being in a fight like this — not one with swords and guns that result in a massacre. There are so many detached body parts on the floor that it looks like a serial killer convention had decided to paint the world’s biggest Picasso homage in human flesh and fluids.

“My cover is blown. It has to be.” 

Someone from the League would have surely escaped to report, and that report will say that Jason hadn’t killed a single person, not even to defend his “allies,” and that will blow his cover. 

Jason has to get out.

_ “I have to get out now!” _

Jason isn’t Dick Grayson. He isn’t the Robin and son that got kidnapped  _ every single week. _ Jason has  _ never _ been kidnapped as Jason Todd, in his civilian identity. And he has only been snatched  _ twice _ as Robin.

It’s the only stat he’s beating Dick in, and he isn’t giving up his right to gloat for anything.

So, footsteps tacky with drying blood — and hell, he has to lose the shoes once he’s out of the warehouse, or even a blind person could follow him — Jason goes in search of a familiar landmark or payphone.

His footsteps stagger and sway as the concussion messes with his balance and eyesight. Now would be an excellent time for B to swoop in and snatch Jason up. He won’t even complain if B wraps Jason up in his cape and carries him like he’s a baby. He just … he really wants his dad now. 

The soles of his feet don’t last long before something cuts into his skin.

“Ow, crap!”

Jason’s fingers fumble when he pulls out a piece of glass, and he almost collapses to the ground when he rips off a bit of his shirt and has to bend in half to tie it around the wound so he won’t leave bloody tracks.

He closes his eyes and counts to ten, praying the universe will give him a break and he won’t vomit again, leaving a huge mess behind showing which way he’s fled. When he’s mostly sure he won’t barf, Jason hobbles forward, toes curled to protect the sliced ball of his foot, eyes squinting as he desperately searches for a payphone.

If he’s in Gotham, and he doesn’t think he is, it’s a part he’s never seen before.

How long does he have before Ra’s’ ninjas catch up? 

“Not long,” he whispers, gaze darting fruitlessly in every direction.

It’s never long with the League.

If he can just find a blasted payphone, everything will be fine! Because if Bruce made it in time to save Jason from the Joker’s bomb, then there’s no chance in hell that he won’t make it in time to extract Jason from the undercover mission and save him from Ra’s and the League.

“Come on.  _ Come on.” _

When Jason  _ finally _ finds a payphone, he makes a collect call that will have B at his side as fast as is humanly — or inhumanly, if Superman or the Flash are available — possible. 

He picks up the black handheld from its cradle, and then uses the number keys to spell out the code that will set off an alarm in the Batcave. That alarm will — in Bruce’s own words, one night while they were reading  _ Julius Caesar _ together — make Bruce stop whatever he is doing and come straight for Jason.

“I’ll catch you. I swear on my parents’ graves, Jason; if you ever use this code,  _ I’ll catch you.” _

The blood on Jason’s hands isn’t quite dry, so he leaves sanguineous smudges on the faded silver keys as he sends the cry for help that Batman will  _ always _ answer.

4\. 2. 2. 7. 8. 7.

_Icarus._


End file.
